


Dog Years

by matadora



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canon Timeline, Established Relationship, M/M, One Shot, POV Chirrut Îmwe, Pre-Rogue One, Space Husbands
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-18
Updated: 2017-01-18
Packaged: 2018-09-18 07:38:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9374792
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/matadora/pseuds/matadora
Summary: And if you had a bad weekI will sing you to sleepOh and I’ll be there waitingIf you start to get jadedI know things are changingBut, darling, I'm sayingI’ve been here all along





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [regents](https://archiveofourown.org/users/regents/gifts).



> • Who wanted a Cassian fic but sorry bb, this is all I can do. At least I never lied to you.  
> • Blanket warning for possible out-of-character and poor-setting writing. The last time I wrote a Star Wars fic was 18 years ago (wow I'm old) so I'm still shaking off my sealegs.  
> • Actually this fic is a bit of a mess but I tried to clean it up as best I can.  
> • Some elements are inspired from real life and huangmei opera lol.  
> • Title and summary are from Maggie Roger’s _[Dog Years](https://open.spotify.com/track/4KzYUVjU81YV2WOc7voIU5)_ from the single of the same name.

If there was anything at all that could be said from his and his friend’s present circumstances, Chirrut decided that it was that he’d at least had years of practice coping with a lack of clear vision. Sadly, blindness did not also protect the eyes from the sharp pinpricks of a raging sandstorm. 

The weather warning had come too late; Jedha City’s doppler radars have long outlived their intended lifespans and the stormtroopers weren’t exactly keen to share their far superior technology. By the time news of the impending dust storm had finally cascaded to the locals, it had only served to confirm the obvious. The outer band had already reached the Holy City and between shoving past the bustle and racing for shelter, there was barely any time left for the merchants to pack up. Some of them had, in the interest of their own well-being, simply thrown a net over their stalls and their wares and hoped for the best. That would ensure that the day following the storm would be interesting, to say the least. 

Baze didn’t leave anything to chance. He’d spent precious time locking away their meager belongings and even more ensuring that Chirrut was properly covered before he allowed them to brave the storm. By then, Jedha City was well within its ferocious embrace and every step they took felt tentative to the power of nature, at best. 

If Chirrut’s world had been a blur of muted shapes and colors in the past, it was even more so now. His sight, or whatever was left of it, had become nothing more than a flat canvas. He could have just kept his eyes closed and achieved the same effect but he didn’t feel right about leaving Baze the full burden of navigating the whirlwind on his own—assuming he could actually make a valuable contribution. He was already huddled close to him as it was, lashed to Baze’s side by an arm as the bigger man used his bulk to shield him from as much of the wildness as he could for which Chirrut was grateful. He couldn’t hear anything past the howling and the scraping and had to turn his echo-box off before it confused him. He couldn’t even dare open his mouth under the fabric that Baze had wrapped him in. About the most he could do was to pray in his mind to the Force for his and his friend’s safety. _I am one with the Force and the Force is with me. I am one with the Force and the Force is with me…_

He was almost stunned out of his thoughts when he heard Baze’s fist smashing on a door. The moment it swung open, Chirrut leaped at the chance to be useful again. “May the Force of others be with you,” he shouted past his scarf and the storm to an imagined face. He didn’t dare free his mouth in the middle of all that whipping sand. “Could you spare a room for two wanderers seeking relief from this storm?”

“Quit with the drama, Chirrut, it’s a bad enough time for it!”

Chirrut was shocked to hear that he’d been led to the doorstep of a friend and would have felt embarrassed for his formal approach if he had the shame for it. Baze all but shoved him in as the woman commanded them, “In, in! There’s sand all over my place,” and he gladly stumbled inside obediently. 

The slamming of the door silenced the roaring winds. Chirrut swayed, bringing down his staff swiftly to the concrete surface between his feet to steady himself. Without Baze’s enormity by his side, filling his senses, grounding him, he felt detached. Like his spirit had been ripped out of his own body. It was jarring to be blind _and_ deaf all at once and so suddenly. He briefly pondered making a joke about it— _Baze, now I’m deaf, too!_ —but decided against further testing his friend who’d pretty much singlehandedly brought them out of danger on his own strength. Instead, he felt for his echo-box and switched it on again, and at once felt relief. Soon he heard the storm thundering beyond the walls, quiet enough not to overpower the shuffling of their hostess’ slippers, the heavy tread of Baze Malbus as he fought past his own coverings, catching his breath.

“Thanks, Ma,” he said. Chirrut knew then where they were: Tyl Maliaris’ apartment, not far from the Holy Quarter. A squat, dark-skinned Nubian from Baze’s description, she was more a friend of his than Chirrut. They came to be acquainted from some favor or other rendered in Jedha although how she came to the moon was a secret she’d kept close to her heart. Baze wagered it had something to do with the Clone Wars. Chirrut knew not to probe. Most especially now that this was the first time they would wait out the storm in Maliaris’ hospitality. He didn’t want to make it the last. Before this, it had been a native named Quasar Koven—an alias, if Chirrut knew of any—who was kind to the Guardians and believed in the Force. He and Chirrut could spend all night in deep conversation. And then suddenly, that stopped. And Koven’s house was reduced to rubble. 

Baze stamped the sand off his clothes. Chirrut finally ripped the kerchief off his face. It smelt of Baze’s sweat and hair. He began stamping his own feet and shaking, dusting and patting his robes down. He ran his hand wildly over his hair and rubbed the sand off the bristles along his cheeks, short and rough. Such a look was not his personal preference, had never been, but it had been a long time since he’d had the full luxury of choice. 

“Sorry about all the sand,” he pleaded humbly, offering a polite smile. “We’ll come back with a jar to put them all in after the storm.”

“Fie! I don’t want your sand, you can take them with you when you leave.”

Chirrut grinned. Maliaris’ patience sounded like the very short length of a bomb’s fuse but it was not as murderous as Baze’s. He could see how the woman and his friend could get along now.

“Besides, where are you going to get the money for the jar?” Her slippers were moving again.

“Don’t take him seriously, it’s just his way of saying thanks,” Baze said. 

“The jar would have been a gift of thanks,” Chirrut pressed, laughing. Maliaris didn’t bother gracing him with a reply as she left although she would have surely heard him. The place sounded small enough, four stone corners with the bare necessities to support its sole resident and some doors, maybe two, leading off to smaller rooms or other pathways. If it had windows, they were sealed tight; the echoes were clear, and Chirrut’s eyes saw darkness shifting lazily, almost like thick oil. 

Baze approached him. He stood in attention to receive. A smile started when the other man flicked his hand lightly over his shoulders and his sleeves, finishing the job he couldn’t. “You’re okay,” came the assessment a second later. Baze sounded proud, as if of his work. 

“The Force was with us,” Chirrut explained proudly, smile growing. “It would never lead us astray.” Baze grunted a reply. _Or it could also have been me,_ was clearly the sentiment behind it. Chirrut grinned again. For all the years that they’d spent together, though, and now they were both well into their fifties, there were moments such as this where Chirrut had to wonder—and worry—if his devotion to the Force—and what should have been Baze’s as well, in better days—was not always so welcome in his relationship with the man. Sometimes, perhaps, Baze might perceive it as something of an excess baggage, as if they could remove it from existence at any given time of their choice. Chirrut only wished he could make the man see it as a source of comfort, though. As he did and as Baze once had. That even when the world seemed to have forsaken them, for as long as there was the Force, they would never truly be left on their own. 

Well, some wounds would take a lifetime to heal. And Chirrut was aware that for all his good intentions, his meager efforts may never be enough to balm them. That was no cause for surrender, though.

So he lifted a hand from the head of his wooden staff to search for his companion’s, hoping to offer some physical comfort instead where his faith had failed, but returned it to its perch soon after when Maliaris’ footsteps returned, still with its snappy gait. He followed Baze’s quieter footfalls to the door creaking open, sweeping the ground with the low end of his staff as he went. 

“It’s a tight room, a bit dusty, but you’ll have to make do,” Maliaris huffed, tossing a pile of fabric to a thin cushion. Chirrut would have to investigate this later but he figured it was probably some bed things, maybe a pillow and a blanket. Carefully, staff on the floor, he tested the limits of their guest quarters. “I don’t get guests too often now after K’mara left.” She snorted. 

“Who’s K’mara?” Baze asked. 

“My partner. We were supposed to have gotten married by now but then she left me for some Twi’lek!”

Chirrut bumped against a wall, stumbling. He caught himself with one hand and shuffled back a little to regain himself. “Sorry,” he said, eyes staring ahead. “Didn’t see that coming.”

Baze burst suddenly with a painful snort, followed by some hurried and labored breathing, as if he was trying to control his laughter and failing miserably. Chirrut himself lost to his own glee, smiling brightly at his highly amused friend. Times like this, he always felt like such a champion. 

Too bad it wasn’t meant to last. Eventually, Baze put himself under control. _Had_ to put himself under control because the silence coming from Maliaris did not sound so happy. He cleared his throat, and that was that. Chirrut schooled his own face to a more timid look, and resumed his exploration.

“One of you is going to have to sleep on the floor.” _And I sincerely hope it’s you, Baze,_ was the implied message. “I’ll look for something you can lie on.”

She left again. Chirrut began his second lap around their modest guest quarters while Baze marched to the bed and grunted heavily, sighing with relief. His generator pack met the floor with a meek but heavy clank.

“Table, chair, window, shelves, consoles, bed,” Baze explained the contents of the room quickly. “Chirrut, you take the bed.”

“I’m perfectly fine with sleeping on the floor, you know?” Chirrut started towards the direction of Baze’s voice, staff out at an angle, tapping it every other second lest he trip on some unseen obstacle. 

_Tap, tap._

“Ammo tank.”

_Tap, tap._

“Bed.”

He arranged himself carefully to sit next to his friend, shrugging off the lightbow from his back to lay it by his feet. “I’m blind. Not arthritic,” he continued. “And I’m not the one carrying the Temple of the Kyber on my back.” He reached to feel for the bed things Maliaris had dropped earlier, pressing down lightly on the too-soft pillow. 

“Would that I did,” Baze scowled. 

“We should trade,” Chirrut suggested pleasantly, leaning a little towards Baze to his right. “Or at least share.”

“Share? Huh! The bed isn’t big enough for the both of us. And I’m not keen to find out who gets kicked down to the floor, anyway.”

“Then we’ll share the floor.”

“And what does that accomplish!”

“This is the best that I can find,” the returning footsteps said, grunting a little under a new weight. “It’s old, it will smell old, but mind you, it’s clean.”

“That’s okay, Ma,” Chirrut assured her happily. “Baze wouldn’t mind, he’s had worse.” Baze scowled again. And they were just talking about trading! He would have to forgive his friend for being playful, though. _Again._

He only wanted to lighten him up, at his expense though it might be. Still, he understood if Baze might not be in the mood just now—first the storm, and then the Force. Once upon a time, they hadn’t needed to worry about these things. 

This time, his hand raced him in reaching for Baze’s, wrapping his fingers around those gloved digits before he took notice. By the time he had, Baze had responded by enclosing his own hand around his. _We’re all right._ They were still all right. 

The contact lasted for all of a second. A heavy fabric fell with a muffled thump on the floor, somewhere in the middle. Maliaris sighed, whistling. “I hope you like flowers.” The fabric flopped and shifted on the floor. 

“I think the flowers are the least of my concerns.”

“What does it look like?” Chirrut tilted his face up, like someone trying to see an object behind a tall fence, as if his eyes would let him. 

“It’s a carpet of a hutt surrounded by flowers,” Baze answered. 

“Why would you have something like that?” Chirrut asked, clearly disturbed. 

“I had a very interesting life before I moved here,” Maliaris answered with practiced ease. Outside, it thundered. 

Chirrut listened to the stone walls vibrate, the storm rage harder. 

Maliaris sighed. “And just now, I miss it,” she said. “If this keeps up, I don’t know how I am going to feed us all three. Storms like this ought to come with at least a day’s warning!”

“Tell _that_ to the Empire,” Baze snarled. “If they hadn’t come to ruin the city, the radars would still be working, or maybe new ones would have been installed! I hope they’re all drowning in sand now.”

“ _Baze._ ” Chirrut spoke gently, turning to him. 

“You want to try, you’re welcome.” In a surprising turn of events, Maliaris sighed. “I don’t plan on getting shot for pushing my luck.”

“There’s nothing for us that should be feared,” Chirrut interjected quickly before Baze might give in to his rising ire, “for all is as the Force wills it.”

“I’m not sure I’m ready to believe that the Force brought suffering to NiJedha, though,” Maliaris shared. “Maybe if you could see what the stormtroopers have done to this place, you wouldn’t feel so calm about it.”

“He _knows_ ,” Baze assured her with a deep growl. “He’s only blind in one way.” After an awkward pause, he added, “Besides…the Force works in mysterious ways. And you know what it is they say. Uhhh…” He slapped his knee once and swayed, tilting carefully one side, and then like a pendulum, swinging back to the other. “A crystal cannot be polished without friction, nor a man perfected without trials.”

It was an old saying they’d learned from their youth in the Temple, and Baze recited it exactly as they did in those days. Chirrut was moved; he smiled cheerfully and moved his shoulders according to Baze’s motion, using his shifting weight on the bed as a guide. When he finished, he drew a tight circle with his head once like he was nodding in approval. He was probably glowing on his cheeks, if they could see it past the darkness and his young beard. 

“ _If_ we’re all jonesing for perfection. Me? I’m not. I just want three square meals and not to get shot at or beaten when I’m crossing the street.” Her slippers shuffled out the door. “Dinner will be in an hour. If you need anything else, I’ll be in the kitchen.”

“Thanks, Ma—oh!” Suddenly, Baze was up, and he was hurrying after her. He caught her just outside the wall and made his request in a low, quiet voice but he, of all, should know that if he wanted to keep it a secret from Chirrut, he might as well not have tried at all. 

“Do you have a shaver and a cream I could borrow?” he heard him ask. Chirrut smiled. He was always so conscientious towards him. 

He wasn’t sure what kind of success Baze was expecting but when he came back, he only told Chirrut, “Come on. Come with me.” And bent low to take both his hands. 

“I’m fine, I can find my way.”

“I don’t remember you trespassing every house in NiJedha to learn their layouts. Just come on, this will be quick.” Baze put his staff in one hand and the other on his shoulder. Then he led him out. 

Chirrut waddled behind Baze, matching him gait for gait, pace for pace, to an audience he hoped wasn’t too busy to watch him, but he stood still in what he figured was a washroom where Baze slathered his cheeks with a cold cream of sorts and carefully scraped him clean with a blade by hand. It was hard not to smile no matter how many times Baze chided him, though—how could he when the man could never catch himself humming to an old song as he worked? Something that played in the audio devices during their rosy youths. He knew it, too, but kept quiet. After a quick haircut on top of the shave, Baze took him by hand and led him out the door and to his seat in the dining table next. 

“Just him?” Maliaris asked, sliding a hot bowl to Chirrut’s waiting hands and tapping his knuckle with his spoon as a way of holding it out to him. “I have more of that cream, enough to take care of all your hair.”

“We Guardians have a saying that other men’s beards are none of your business.”

“Baze needs all his hair for his strength,” Chirrut chirped along. “If you remove it, he won’t be able to carry his gun anymore.”

“Chirrut wouldn’t like that.”

“Eat,” Maliaris snapped. “Before the stew becomes cold!”

They ate as the whipping sands banged on the door and the windows and the skies grumbled with occasional thunder. A single lamp was lit on the table, buzzing softly as it pulsed. Maliaris didn’t know how long the storm would last so she wanted to stretch out her resources for as long as she could. 

They left her to wash after them and stepped back into their humble room, this time closing the door. Baze found his place on the bed again, dragging his generator pack closer to inspect it for damages and perhaps more sand while Chirrut found his place beside him, as he would. 

He turned to the metals coming apart, the tinkle of tiny items meeting the ground. “Are you feeling better now?” he asked him quietly. 

He and Baze have had a long, colorful history together—but somehow, it still wasn’t long enough to keep Baze on his guard with a good lie. A heartbeat passed, barely noticeable for some, before he said, “I’m glad to be fed and out of the storm.” He might as well have flinched. “It feels good to be inside stone walls again.”

Chirrut smiled.

Clearing his throat, he swung his face forward, and started to dance like a reed plant sideways, bending to a graceful, cautious wind. “A crystal cannot be polished without friction, nor a man perfected without trials.” He sung a little as he spoke. He never forgot how to sing, although the years had certainly been trying. 

He glanced sideways to the working Baze and added quietly, “You didn’t say that for her.” _You said that for me._

He was right. Baze confessed, “I wanted to cheer you up.”

Another smile. “That’s not difficult. If there’s someone here who needs cheering up, it’s you.” Chirrut reached blindly for those bound locks of his friend’s, and carried them back over his shoulder. “The Force may move in mysterious ways, but it is not so mysterious as to leave us in constant anxiety. For as long as we have it, we shall never be found wanting.”

Metal fell on metal, and silence came easily like a greedy wave. “So I suppose we can rest easy, then,” Baze snapped. “Just sit back and relax, stop fighting every day for food, for charity, for justice, for our lives. Let the Force do its work like what it says in the tin.”

“Baze…” Where anger and offense should have found him, Chirrut only found sorrow and disappointment to express. He frowned, heart heavy. It was a pain, always, to hear his friend speak of the ever-living Force he was once so devoted to in that way. 

“The Force may come in our time of need.” Baze set to work again. “Maybe it was with us out in the storm, but that doesn’t mean that we should have sat still, waiting for our honored guest to come and save us. I’m not going to wait for the fruit to drop with my mouth wide open so until it appears out of nowhere, I’m not going to stop fighting for us.”

How do you defend something you love from someone else you love who does not love it? Chirrut’s silence was sadly not one that came with meditation, with listening to the will of the Force. It was the silence of the helpless, the feeble and the lost. How can he do this? He felt so frustrated and sad. What could he do? 

“Baze,” he started again. Without the Force to guide him, though, he could only say what was in his heart. A secret he wished he kept even from himself. “I worry about you…”

“ _That’s_ what worries me,” Baze replied. Chirrut was shocked and confused. “You shouldn’t have to think about me. I can do that for the both of us.”

“I always think about you, Baze,” Chirrut said, grinning slightly. “You constantly surround yourself with me and my needs…I wish you would rest sometimes. You pushed yourself out there in the storm, looking after the both of us.” He reached to squeeze Baze’s hand again. “I wish I could have helped you carry us along, but I only had enough to pray for us.”

“You have the Force,” Baze began to explain, but it was some time when he added quietly, “I only have you.”

Chirrut wanted to smile. It was about the sweetest thing that could come out of Baze’s lips, like the old fruits of Jedha when they still grew. And perhaps he missed them, because he ached when he tried and his smile faltered. The pain could only come from a human source, though. His memories, his weakness. 

He didn’t know when he would see Baze smile again. That clumsy little shift up one side of his lips, at once uncertain and shy. It seemed to clash with his image… 

Only his knowledge of the man told him now that that was the kind of smile that he was wearing, memorized by heart as a desperate last plea against blindness. Longing, he seized Baze’s familiar face, traced the hardened wrinkles that clashed with the younger man in his head, the scars of time gone by, some spent together, more spent apart. That smile was there, just as he knew it. 

Chirrut smiled back in relief. At least some things never change.

Baze’s arms weighed down heavily around him while he pulled the man closer to kiss him on his forehead, then tucked him in under his own embrace to add another kiss to the top of his wild hair. “So long as we have the Force,” he said, “we shall always have friends. And for as long as we have each other, we shall always have a home.”

∞

The storm peaked as midnight closed in. By the time they woke up at dawn, the world seemed quiet outside their walls. 

Baze got dressed and stepped out to check the city. When he came back, he was dusting sand from his clothes again. “The worst is gone,” he said, thumping and shuffling about. “We’ll be out of here before morning ends.”

They waited out the rest of the storm inside their room, Baze checking on Chirrut’s lightbow and Chirrut on his morning rituals, and then joined Maliaris for breakfast: leftover stew, warm bread and salty, dried tentacles. 

And just like that, the weather cleared and Jedha City was alive again. They got lucky this time. Baze was thanking Maliaris for her hospitality when Chirrut stumbled upon what felt like a mirror outside their room. He straightened himself up facing it, tugging on his robe, his belt of lightbow bullets and ran his hand over his hair. The silence was so thick that Chirrut almost broke it with his laughter. 

“Wait now, I thought…I thought your friend’s blind…”

“Don’t, Ma, just…just don’t,” Baze advised her wisely. 

Penniless but grateful, Chirrut considered it his parting gift for their old hostess before he stepped out of her tiny apartment, into the chill morning of a city waking up. 

Light splashed like spilling water from an overturned washing tub. Fat blobs shifted about with some existential purpose his eyes and his brain could no longer decipher. He scratched at the ground with one end of his staff and then more carefully with the toe of one shoe. 

“Ugh! Mud,” Baze confirmed his suspicions for him, practically wearing his frown and his discontent on his growl. “Come on, Chirrut.”

“I’ll be right behind you,” he assured him, the response automatic.

They picked their way carefully back to the merchant stalls, back to what sufficed as “home” for the time being: a tiny square in some unseen corner at the back and to the wall, too tiny and hidden for anyone to want to fight them for, assuming they weren’t yet discouraged by Baze’s cannons. Chirrut sat in the open, diligently addressing the passers-by, “May the Force of others be with you. May the Force of others be with you…” while Baze quarreled with the Dressellian in charge of the lockers: “That was just ten credits yesterday! Now you’re demanding twelve?!”

The merchants picked their own arguments left and right—someone’s wares had been stolen, someone had seized the chance to do it during the sandstorm, someone was just jealous, crazy. It was the stormtroopers’ fault, it was Saw Gerrera’s doing…

Chirrut hid with Baze back at their little stall while emotions were high, the other man spreading the tarp that would later become their roof. While he was sure he could stop any fight that got too physical, he didn’t want to be involved, and it was useless to share his faith on such an audience besides. Worse, the situation was ripe for stormtroopers to take advantage of—and he wanted to be involved with them the least, partly because of the first reason. 

He tried not to brood. He knew that it did them little good but it was difficult to forget about his distaste of the Empire, of his selfishness once he remembered their crimes towards him and towards the others. He was no Jedi, after all. The Force wouldn’t strike him down for having such natural, impure thoughts about them. 

But, perhaps, it found a way—as it was wont to do. Although it could not remove Chirrut from the trauma, or his vindictive ideas, it could at least distract him from them.

It came as a quiet friend; a relief from the invasive drone in his head, like a swarm of angry flies filling his skull and growing ever louder. Little by little, all that buzzing melted away, and then suddenly, there was nothing to hear—and everything to fear.

Caution. That was the word for it. And Chirrut longed to give it relief from it. _It_ —for it was not his own nervous heart that he felt, but something else’s.

He turned, and when it moved, he rose and began to follow it, leaving behind his lightbow and Baze to pursue his quest. His feet fell soundlessly, he had to be careful not to scare it away.

Suddenly, the voices were gone, the tide of pitches had faded away and the world felt brighter and cleaner, wider. The quiet he followed felt, soft, tender. Curious and even funny. Playful—like him! He smiled despite himself. What would Baze think again?

He wove his way in and out of the sparse street, careful to avoid shoulders, to slip between feet. When it paused, he tensed, frozen but ready to leap at a moment’s notice. He began to perceive the world differently, pick out the starch from the washing, the spice from the gravy, the ringing bells, the sizzling, the purr, the scraping feet and padding steps. 

It moved again and so did he, although not quite bouncing as the little one did. It began to hurry but he, with his longer legs, took his time. 

They turned, both of them, ducked under awnings and hangings, stepped aside from barreling speeders. He tasted the overripe fruits, the tangy alcohol, smelled the sweat dried over backs, the warm hide of animals, the fumes, the fragrance of freshly ground ink. 

And then the musky smell at the back of a junkyard, with its own angry voices, the kind buoyed by friendly quarrels. A metal plate fell on another, a fire roared. 

It stopped. And mewled. Chirrut tapped the ground lightly with his staff as he approached, coming slowly so as not to discourage the tiny thing with his intentions. “Don’t be afraid,” he beckoned to it kindly, crouching and reaching out blindly towards it. “The Force has brought the both of us together.”

It seemed that the world was just holding its breath, waiting to hear his voice pop his bubble before it returned him to that mundane plane where all sounds and all smells blended indistinguishably with each other. And when it did, it came with a vengeance. “Chirrut!” Baze called. “Chirrut, where are you?” It figures that he wouldn’t be able to escape his minder for so long. 

The creature darted at the sound of Baze’s voice, straight into Chirrut’s open hand. It _was_ soft, and light and delicate and warm. It felt thin and fragile under its fur. It cried quietly again, shaking. 

“Don’t be afraid, that’s just Baze,” Chirrut said to it, beaming. “Although I admit, he could appear scary sometimes…”

“Chirrut! What are you…” Those heavy footsteps stopped when Chirrut rose and turned towards it, creature in hand. It was so small, he could carry it in his palm! “What in NiJedha’s name is that.” Immediate disapproval prevented him from honoring his friend’s discovery with an honest question. 

“I found it,” Chirrut announced victoriously, smile wide, sliding his staff on the ground, and then stepping over a thick cable sticking out the dirt. He also didn’t honor him with a helpful response. “It felt afraid. I think it might have lost its home during the storm.”

Baze snorted. “I’ve heard that story before…”

Chirrut offered a sympathetic smile—for he only knew it too well, too. “What does it look like?”

“Umm…white and brown, the brown in patches, mostly near its tail. Two ears, two eyes, a face, four feet…”

“Sounds friendly.” Now that one, he said mostly to needle. He could only imagine Baze’s face now. “Shall we go, then? I didn’t mean to leave without a word.” He started past his friend. 

“Wait,” Baze said. “You’re taking that thing along?”

The question confused Chirrut, his brows arching. “Well, I can’t just leave it here.”

“Chirrut, we’re homeless,” Baze sputtered bluntly, but also half-astounded. “A homeless can’t give another homeless a home.”

“A home can be many things, Baze.” He marched on. 

“We don’t even have anything to feed that thing with!” Baze turned to follow him. 

“The Force will provide,” Chirrut assured him, confident. He looked over his shoulder. “The Force _always_ provides.”

 _Little Force_. That was what he’d decided to call it. It was through the Force that he found it and so it was with the Force that it would be named. Baze was hard-pressed to do anything about it. Chirrut wondered if he ought to feel guilty about forcing the man to put up with his whims _again_ but he liked the animal. He felt attached to it instantly and only hoped that Baze would come to understand the connection soon. Who knows, Baze himself could grow fond of Little Force! Chirrut would hold his breath. He would, again. As he always did. 

To mollify his dear friend, Chirrut announced that he would take full responsibility for the animal. Not that he knew Baze expected otherwise but he didn’t think there was any problem with stating the obvious. He was happy. He could even say he felt young, again.

He fed it from his own plate, let it drink from his own cup. He played with it and let it sleep near his side. He liked to run his fingers down its slender form, trace patterns on its smooth fur, up to its stubby tail. Sometimes, the animal would nip at him with its little fangs or poke him with a wet nose, and that made him laugh. During the day, it would leave them to pursue its own interests but in time, it learned to come back to him and Baze. In time, Baze learned to wait for it. 

He woke up once in the middle of the night, sensing a little hunger until he realized that it wasn’t him. The tiny, little mewls said as much. With a little urgency, Chirrut started to get up, but stopped when he heard a man say, “Here you are.”

Baze. Those were his feet, that was his smell. Little Force became silent in its contentment, except for its moving jaws and lapping tongue.

“You’re not so bad, are you?” Baze said to it. Little Force purred in agreement. 

This was not the first time the animal tested Baze’s fondness for it, and this was not the first time Baze answered honestly. Chirrut smiled and closed his eyes again. 

He fell asleep to Baze humming a ballad from their youth. 

That was the last that he heard of the little animal. 

It disappeared the next day and never came back. Chirrut didn’t think they should go looking for the stray animal that belonged to NiJedha as much as they did, but he missed it terribly. And the absence bothered him that Baze had to try. When he returned, though, it was news of an accident concerning several repulsorlifts that he brought back. And nothing more than deep silence. 

That was all Chirrut needed to hear, having suspected something of the like. He nodded, asked after any injuries and said nothing more. He tried not to take it too hard, but it was difficult. It was still a loss, no matter how he put it, and he’d grown to love Little Force and its curious, down-to-earth nature. He’d gotten used to it by his side, sticking around, appearing suddenly out of nowhere, wandering but never too far to lose its way. He’d let it had become a part of him as much as Baze was one half of his soul. 

“It figures that the first novice I try to recruit into Guardianship would back out before the going got tough,” Chirrut joked that afternoon all of a sudden, breaking his contemplative silence. He sat under the tarp that served as his and Baze’s roof. The sun was setting and the stalls have started packing up. He leaned a little towards his friend who was inspecting his modified gun as if he’d just used it, smiling to show him he was cheerful. “It has been a while since I tried, after all.”

“It’s been a while since you tried to lie to me, too,” Baze responded readily. 

Chirrut’s smile shrunk, but stubborn like him, it still hung on. “I only wanted to cheer you up,” he said, recalling a similar conversation they had, not too long ago. “Well, maybe I just expected too much of this place. Remember when we waited out the storm in Ma’s place?” he continued relentlessly, undefeated though found out. “I may not know what NiJedha looks like now, but I know how badly it’s been treated. Maybe I was in a state of denial. But when I found Little Force, I thought…maybe NiJedha isn’t as bad as you think it is.” He grinned. “Well, that’s just me. And you were right, of course. I’d always known you were right.”

Baze’s motions ceased. With a creeping knowledge, Chirrut felt his friend’s eyes burning on him. 

“The Force gives and the Force takes away,” Chirrut concluded, contented to have made sense of his loss. He did so with a satisfied nod. If his staff wasn’t on the ground beside him, he might have tapped it. Like a definitive period. “It has always been that way and it will not change for us.”

“The Force also provides, though,” Baze hastened to say. “But just the bare necessities. Like a home.” His fingers crept closer to Chirrut’s. “And a home can be many things.”

Hearing those words echoed back to him, by his dearest friend no less, made him feel warm and whole inside. He shifted his hand closer to his friend’s, hooking digits loosely. 

Dipping his head, he decided, “You’re only saying that to cheer me up.”

Baze shrugged. “You _do_ need to cheer up. We still have to find food for dinner. And it’s easier for me to do it if I have someone blind along.”

That grin came back. Typical of Baze to stay practical, even if it was on his expense. Where would he ever be without him? 

Baze shuffled a little closer, and said closely to him, “Some of us come back.”

He turned towards his breath, his pulsating warmth. The Force moved differently around creatures. Little Force was soft and light but Baze, he was just…warm. And big and…safe. Familiar. Exactly like home. 

He let that rough hand tilt his head to a broad shoulder, felt the bristles of Baze’s mustache and beard on his skin as he kissed him lightly on his scalp. Chirrut rested his weight on him, surrendering freely to his heat, curling his fingers more tightly around his friend’s between them. He felt relieved and complete. 

“The Force is with me and I am with the Force,” he stated happily. “And I fear nothing.”


End file.
